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Consomme with Poached Eggs

A clear consommé served with poached eggs, seasoned with salt, vinegar, and coarse black pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,814 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Consomme with Poached Eggs

Ingredients

Directions

Poach the eggs

  1. Combine water, salt, and vinegar in a small pan.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  3. Crack two eggs into a saucer.

  4. Gently slip the eggs into the boiling water.

  5. Simmer until the eggs are firm.

  6. Use a perforated skimmer to remove the eggs.

  7. Place the poached eggs in a pan of cold water.

Serve

  1. Place the eggs in a tureen.

  2. Pour hot broth over the eggs.

  3. Add a pinch of coarse black pepper just before serving.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  3. Vinegar + chickentop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,344 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  4. Egg + chickentop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,991 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  5. Vinegar + eggtop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,922 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Vinegar and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,922 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set proteins form the soft, tender body of the poached eggs in the consommé.
Vinegar
Acid helps the egg whites coagulate quickly and keep a compact shape in the water.
Broth
Hot broth provides the savory liquid that surrounds and flavors the eggs.

The step that matters

Gently slip the eggs into the boiling water. Eggs dropped in harshly scatter their whites. Gentle entry into water held at a simmer lets the whites set around the yolk, keeping each egg intact.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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